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Paul Carus
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 3/26/19
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Paul Carus
Paul Carus (German: [ˈkaːʀʊs]; 18 July 1852 – 11 February 1919) was a German-American author, editor, a student of comparative religion[1] and philosopher.[2]
Life and education
Carus was born in Ilsenburg, Germany, and educated at the universities of Strassburg (then Germany, now France) and Tübingen, Germany. After obtaining his PhD from Tübingen in 1876[3] he served in the army and then taught school. He had been raised in a pious and orthodox Protestant home, but gradually moved away from this tradition.[4]
He left Bismarck's Imperial Germany for the United States, "because of his liberal views".[2][5] After he immigrated to the USA (in 1884) he lived in Chicago, and in LaSalle, Illinois. Paul Carus married Edward C. Hegeler's daughter Mary (Marie) and the couple later moved into the Hegeler Carus Mansion, built by her father. They had six children.[6]
Career
In the United States, Carus briefly edited a German-language journal and wrote several articles for the Index, the Free Religious Association organ.[1]
Soon after, he became the first managing editor of the Open Court Publishing Company, founded in 1887 by his father-in-law.[5] The goals of Open Court were to provide a forum for the discussion of philosophy, science, and religion, and to make philosophical classics widely available by making them affordable.[6]
He also acted as the editor for two periodicals published by the company, The Open Court and The Monist.[3]
He was introduced to Charles Sanders Peirce, the founder of American Pragmatism, by Judge Francis C. Russell of Chicago. Carus stayed abreast of Peirce's work and would eventually publish a number of his articles.[7]
During his lifetime, Carus published 75 books and 1500 articles,[8] mostly through Open Court Publishing Company. He wrote books and articles on history, politics, philosophy, religion, logic, mathematics, anthropology, science, and social issues of his day. In addition, Carus corresponded with many of the greatest minds of the late 19th and early 20th century, sending and receiving letters from Leo Tolstoy, Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla, Booker T. Washington, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Ernst Mach, Ernst Haeckel, John Dewey, and many more.
Carus's world view and philosophy
Carus considered himself a theologian rather than philosopher. He referred to himself as "an atheist who loved God".[9][10]
Carus is proposed to be a pioneer in the promotion of interfaith dialogue. He explored the relationship of science and religion, and was instrumental in introducing Eastern traditions and ideas to the West.[5] He was a key figure in the introduction of Buddhism to the West,[4] sponsoring Buddhist translation work of D.T. Suzuki, and fostering a lifelong working friendship with Buddhist Master, Soyen Shaku. Carus' interest in Asian religions seems to have intensified after he attended the World's Parliament of Religions (in 1893).
For years afterwards, Carus was a strong sympathizer of Buddhist ideas, but stopped short of committing fully to this, or any other, religion. Instead, he ceaselessly promoted his own rational concept which he called the "Religion of Science." Carus had a selective approach and he believed that religions evolve over time. After a battle for survival, he expected a "cosmic religion of universal truth" to emerge from the ashes of traditional beliefs.[4]
Carus proposed his own philosophy similar to panpsychism known as 'panbiotism', which he defined as "everything is fraught with life; it contains life; it has the ability to live."[11]
Religion of Science
Carus was a follower of Benedictus de Spinoza; he was of the opinion that Western thought had fallen into error early in its development in accepting the distinctions between body and mind and the material and the spiritual. (Kant's phenomenal and noumenal realms of knowledge; Christianity's views of the soul and the body, and the natural and the supernatural). Carus rejected such dualisms, and wanted science to reestablish the unity of knowledge.[12] The philosophical result he labeled Monism.[1]
His version of monism is more closely associated with a kind of pantheism, although it was occasionally identified with positivism.[10] He regarded every law of nature as a part of God's being. Carus held that God was the name for a cosmic order comprising "all that which is the bread of our spiritual life." He held the concept of a personal God as untenable. He acknowledged Jesus Christ as a redeemer, but not as the only one, for he believed that other religious founders were equally endowed with similar qualities.[10]
His beliefs attempted to steer a middle course between idealistic metaphysics and materialism. He differed with metaphysicians because they "reified" words and treated them as if they were realities, and he objected to materialism because it ignored or overlooked the importance of form. Carus emphasized form by conceiving of the divinity as a cosmic order. He objected to any monism which sought the unity of the world, not in the unity of truth, but in the oneness of a logical assumption of ideas. He referred to such concepts as henism, not monism.[10]
Carus held that truth was independent of time, human desire, and human action. Therefore, science was not a human invention, but a human revelation which needed to be apprehended; discovery meant apprehension; it was the result or manifestation of the cosmic order in which all truths were ultimately harmonious.[10]
Criticisms of Carus' ideas
It is claimed that Carus was dismissed by Orientalists and philosophers alike because of his failure to comply with the rules of either discipline.[13]
Legacy
The legacy of Paul Carus is honored through the efforts of the Hegeler Carus Foundation, the Carus Lectures at the American Philosophical Association (APA), and the Paul Carus Award for Interreligious Understanding[14] by the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions (CPWR).
Bibliography
His publications include:
• The Open Court Fortnightly Journal Vol 1 1887-1888
• The Soul Of Man: An Investigation Of The Facts Of Physiological And Experimental Psychology (1891, republished 2006) ISBN 1-4286-1359-5
• Monism: Its Scope and Import (1891)
• Homilies of Science (The Open Court Publishing Co., 1892)
• The Religion of Science (1893, republished 2007) ISBN 1-4304-4286-7
• Truth in fiction: twelve tales with a moral 1893
• The Philosophy of the Tool 1893
• The Gospel of Buddha (1894) ISBN 0-87548-228-7[15]
• Buddhism and Its Christian Critics (1894, republished 2005) ISBN 0-7661-9140-0
• The History of the Devil and the Idea of Evil (1900) ISBN 0-517-15064-6[16]
• Eros and Psyche: A fairy-tale of ancient Greece, retold after Apuleius (1900)
• Fundamental problems; the method of philosophy as a systematic arrangement of knowledge 1903
• The Surd of Metaphysics (1903)
• The Nature of the State 1904
• Kant and Spencer; a study of the fallacies of agnosticism 1904
• Karma: A Story of Buddhist Ethics (1905, republished 2004) ISBN 0-7661-9172-9
• Primer of philosophy 1906
• Story of Samson and its Place in the Religious Development of Mankind (1907, republished 2003) ISBN 0-7661-3877-1
• The Bride Of Christ: A Study In Christian Legend Lore (1908)
• The Foundations of Mathematics (1908,[17] republished 2004) ISBN 1-59605-006-3
• GOD: An Enquiry into the Nature of Man's Highest Ideal and a Solution of the Problem from the Standpoint of Science (1908, republished 2007) ISBN 1-60206-390-7
• The Philosopher's Martyrdom; A Satire 1908
• Godward; a record of religious progress 1908
• The Pleroma: An Essay on the Origin of Christianity (1909)
• Philosophy as a Science: A Synopsis of the Writings of Paul Carus (1909)
• The Philosophy of Form (1911, republished 2007) ISBN 1-4304-9402-6
• The Mechanistic Principle and the Non-Mechanical: An Inquiry into Fundamentals With Extracts from Representatives of Either Side (1913) ISBN 0-912050-69-1[18]
• The Principle of Relativity In the Light of the Philosophy of Science (1913, republished 2004) ISBN 0-7661-9185-0
• Nietzsche and Other Exponents of Individualism (1914,[19] republished 2007) ISBN 1-4325-2343-0
• Goethe, with special consideration of his philosophy, by Paul Carus 1915
• Kant's Prolegomena (1902, republished 1947)
• The Rise of Man: A Sketch of the Origin of the Human Race ISBN 1-4179-5157-5 (republished 2004)
• The Ethical Problem 1899 (republished 2005) ISBN 1-4212-7343-8
See also
• American philosophy
• List of American philosophers
• Necessitarianism
• Pleroma
References
1. Oriental Ideas in American Thought, from Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Studies of Selected Pivotal Ideas, edited by Philip P. Wiener (Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1973–74).
2. Austrian Philosophy, by Barry Smith, Note
3. The Monist:An International Quarterly Journal of General Philosophical Inquiry, featuring essays from scholars around the globe.
4. The American Encounter with Buddhism, 1844–1912: Victorian Culture and the Limits of Dissent, by Thomas A. Tweed (Paperback), page 65-67
5. "Open Court: About Us". http://www.opencourtbooks.com.
6. History of the Heleger Carus Foundation – The Hegeler Carus Mansion Archived 28 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
7. William James and Yogaacaara philosophy: A comparative inquiry, by Miranda Shaw, (University of Hawaii Press, 1987), page 241, note 4
8. History of the Heleger Carus Foundation – Open Court Publishing Company Archived 28 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
9. The Gospel of Buddha, by Paul Carus, page 26
10. Recent American Thought Archived 2 March 2008 at the Wayback Machine, from The Radical AcademyArchived 30 March 2008 at the Wayback Machine
11. Skrbina, David. (2005). Panpsychism in the West. MIT Press. p. 149. ISBN 0-262-19522-4
• Carus Paul (1893). "Panpsychism and Panbiotism". The Monist. 3 (2): 234–257. doi:10.5840/monist18933222. JSTOR 27897062.
12. Meyer, Donald Harvey (Winter 1962). "Paul Carus and the Religion of Science". American Quarterly. 14 (4): 597–607. doi:10.2307/2710135. JSTOR 2710135.
13. Future Religion – Making an American Buddha Archived 10 November 2013 at the Wayback Machine, by Judith Snodgrass. A review of republished The Gospel of Buddha
14. The Paul Carus Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Interreligious Movement Archived 16 June 2006 at the Wayback Machine. See also: Carus Award 2004 Archived27 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
15. "The Gospel of Buddha - Paul Carus (1894) - Index Document". http://www.mountainman.com.au.
16. "History of the Devil Index". http://www.sacred-texts.com.
17. Owens, Frederick William (1910). "Review: The Foundations of Mathematics by Paul Carus". Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 16: 541–542. doi:10.1090/S0002-9904-1910-01969-8.
18. "Review: The Mechanistic Principle and the Non-Mechanical by Paul Carus". The Harvard Theological Review. 7 (2): 271–272. April 1914. doi:10.1017/s0017816000011196.
19. Salter, William Mackintire (July 1915). "Review of 4 books:Nietzsche and Other Exponents of Individualism by Paul Carus;The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche by H. L. Mencken; The Philosophy of Nietzsche: An Exposition and an Appreciation by Georges Chatterton-Hill; Nietzsche, sein Leben und seine Werkeby Richard M. Meyer". The Harvard Theological Review. 8 (3): 400–408. doi:10.1017/s0017816000008993.
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Paul Carus
by Theosophy Wiki
Accessed: 3/20/21
Paul Carus
Dr. Paul Carus was a German-American writer and editor based in Chicago and La Salle, Illinois. As editor of the Open Court Publishing Company, he published hundreds of books and articles that were very influential in the fields of comparative religion, philosophy, science, and mathematics. His work with D. T. Suzuki in translating Chinese and Japanese texts was particularly noteworthy.
Dr. Carus wrote of the principle that guided his work:
Early life and education
Paul Carus was born at Ilsenburg in Germany on July 18, 1852. His parents were Gustave Carus and Laura Krueger Carus.
He studied at the University of Greifswald, completed a degree at the University of Strasbourg in 1876, and then a Ph. D. at the University of Tubingen. Paul emigrated to the United States around 1884 on the SS Grecian Monarch.[2] In 1887 he was invited by Edward C. Hegeler, to help educate his children in the classics at the family home in La Salle, Illinois.[3] Hegeler had come to the United States in 1857 and established a huge zinc mining business in central Illinois, along with other businesses and the Open Court Publishing Company in Chicago. Dr. Carus began contributing articles to a journal that Hegeler founded in 1887, and in 1888 was married to Hegeler's daughter Mary. On May 23, 1889, Carus became a naturalized American citizen at a court in New York.[4]
Paul Carus
Open Court Publishing Company
The Open Court Publishing Company was founded in 1887 by Edward C. Hegeler, who remained as president when he brought Paul Carus on board as editor. The editorial office was located at 324 Dearborn Street in Chicago. The Open Court was published from 1887 to 1936, and a philosophical journal, The Monist, is a quarterly that was founded in 1888 and continues publication today under the auspices of Oxford University Press. The publishing company was also responsible for printing over 500 books on philosophy, science, mathematics, Eastern religions, Christianity, and other subjects.
1893 World's Parliament of Religions
Dr. Carus attended the World's Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893 and made a 30-minute talk on "Science as Religious Revelation." At that time he had the opportunity to meet many visiting representatives of Eastern religions, including some Theosophists:
Paul Carus
The Paul Carus Award for interreligious understanding was instituted in 2001 by the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions following a donation by the family Dr. Carus. Since then it has been awarded at the Parliments in Barcelona (2004), Melbourne (2009), and Salt Lake City (2015).
Theosophical Society connections
Dr. Carus was certainly acquainted with Theosophists and with others who were indirectly connected to the Theosophical Movement, but he was never a member of any Theosophical Society. Theosophy was never a major interest to him. An article in the April 1904 issue of his journal The Monist (entitled "Mme Blavatsky" and authored by Henry Ridgeley Evans), was riddled with inaccuracies.[7] However, his publications were widely read, reviewed, and recommended by Theosophists.
Work with D. T. Suzuki
D. T. Suzuki (October 1870 – July 12, 1966) lived with the Carus family for eleven years in La Salle, Illinois, which became known as “Buddhism’s Gateway to the West.” Carus and Suzuki worked together on translations of texts from Chinese and Japanese languages. One notable work published in 1900 was Açvaghosha's discourse on the awakening of faith in the Mahâyâna, the Chinese version of the Sanskrit manuscript Mahayanasraddhotpadasastra by Asvaghosa. Other examples of titles published in Chicago by Open Court Publishing were:
• Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro; Carus, Paul. Yin chih wen; the tract of the quiet Way, with extracts from the Chinese commentary. 1906. 48 pages. Translated from the Chinese. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro; Carus, Paul. T`ai-shang kan-ying p`ien. 1906. Treatise of the Exalted One on response and retribution. Translated from the Chinese, with sixteen plates by Chinese artists, and a frontispiece by Keichyu Yamada. Available at Hathitrust.
• Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro; Shaku, Soen. Sermons of a Buddhist abbot; addresses on religious subjects. 1906. Sermons of Soen Shaku translated from the Japanese by Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki.
Personal life
Paul and Mary Carus
Dr. Carus and his wife Mary had six children named Edward, Gustave, Paula, Elizabeth, Herman, and Alwin. They lived in La Salle, Illinois, at 1307 Seventh Street, with his father-in-law Edward C. Hegeler. The house, now known as the Hegeler Carus Mansion, was built for Edward C. Hegeler in 1876. The Carus family also lived for a time at the Julius W. Hegeler I Home, another historic mansion in La Salle. That house was designed by Chicago architects Pond and Pond, who also designed the L. W. Rogers Building, headquarters of the Theosophical Society in America. Because Paul Carus brought Buddhist visitors to stay at his home, La Salle became known as “Buddhism’s Gateway to the West.”
Dr. Carus died at home on February 11, 1919. According to the Hegeler Carus Foundation website, "The legacy of Paul Carus is honored through the efforts of the Hegeler Carus Foundation, the Paul Carus Award for Interreligious Understanding by the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions (CPWR) and through Open Court Publishing, which is still operated by the Carus Family and specializes in scholarly and trade non-fiction, with an emphasis on philosophy, social issues, Eastern thought, education, psychology, Jungian analysis, and religion and science."[8]
Carus Lectures are given by distinguished philosophers at meetings of the American Philosophical Association.
Correspondence
Much of the correspondence between Carus and other influential people still exists:
Writings
Dr. Carus wrote hundreds of articles for The Open Court and The Monist, but none for Theosophical journals. Theosophists were keenly aware of his work however, and the Union Index of Theosophical Periodicals lists 24 articles that were reprints or reviews of Carus works.
Open Court Publishing Company in Chicago was responsible for issuing about 75 books by Dr. Carus, and has continued reprinting some of them since. A summary of his writings until 1909 is found in Philosophy as a Science: a Synopsis of Writings of Dr. Paul Carus, Containing an Introduction Written by Himself, Summaries of His Books, and a List of Articles to Date. The extent of his writing is evident to the reader who sees 64 pages of book synopses and 95 pages briefly summarizing each article. Carus writings are also listed at Online Books webpage.
The following sections exemplify the range of his books.
The Gospel of Buddhism
The Gospel of Buddha: According to Old Records was the most influential work of Carus. In addition to numerous English editions beginning with the 1894 edition from Open Court Publishing Co., the book was translated into Japanese, German, Chinese, French, Hebrew, Spanish, Polish, Telugu, and Hindi. These are some of the editions:
• The Gospel of Buddha: According to Old Records. 1894. 308 pages. Available at Internet Archive.
• The Gospel of Buddha. Open Court Publishing Co. 1895. 3rd revised edition. 275 pages.
• The Gospel of Buddha. Open Court Publishing Co. 1915. 310 pages. "Compiled from ancient records by Paul Carus; illustrated by O. Kopetzky." Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The Gospel of Buddha: According to Old records. Open Court Publishing Co. 2004. Revised and enlarged edition. 522 pages." Paul Carus; introd. by Martin J. Verhoeven; foreword by Donald S. Lopez; pref. by Blouke Carus; illustrations by Keichu Yamada and Olga Kopetzky."
• Hanna, Boyd. The Sayings of Buddha. 1957. Derived from the Carus work.
Fiction and poetry
• Karma, a story of Buddhist ethics. 1903. Fiction. Illustrated by Kwason Suzuki.
• K'ung Fu Tze; a Dramatic Poem. 1915. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• Nirvâna, a Story of Buddhist Psychology. 1902. Fiction. Illustrations by Kwasong Suzuki. Available at Google Books.
Non-fiction
• Amitabha: a Story of Buddhist Theology. 1906. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive. Translated into German and Thai.
• The Bride of Christ; a Study in Christian Legend Lore. 1908. Available at Hathitrust and other sources.
• Chinese Thought; an Exposition of the Main Characteristic Features of the Chinese World-conception'. 1907. 195 pages. Abridged version published as "Chinese Astrology in La Salle, 1974.
• The Canon of Reason and Virtue (Lao-tze's Tao Teh King) / Translated from the Chinese. 1903. Available at Hathitrust.
• The Dharma, or, The Religion of Enlightenment: an Exposition of Buddhism. 1896. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• Eros and Psyche: a Fairy-tale of Ancient Greece, Retold after Apuleius. 1900. Illustrations by Paul Thumann. Available at Internet Archive and Hathitrust.
• God; an Enquiry into the Nature of Man's Highest Ideal and a Solution of the Problem from the Standpoint of Science. 1908. Available at Hathitrust, Freading, and other sources.
• Goethe, with Special Consideration of His Philosophy. 1915. 357 pages. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The History of the Devil and the Idea of Evil, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day. 1900. Available at Hathitrust and other sources.
• Kant and Spencer; a Study of the Fallacies of Agnosticism. 1899. Available at Hathitrust and Google Books.
• Lao-tze's Tao-Teh-King / Chinese-English. With introduction, transliteration, and notes. 1898. Available at Internet Archive.
• Philosophy as a Science: a Synopsis of Writings of Dr. Paul Carus, Containing an Introduction Written by Himself, Summaries of His Books, and a List of Articles to Date. 1909. 213 pages. Available at Internet Archive, Hathitrust, and other sources. Reprinted 1911, 1968.
• Personality, with Special Reference to Superpersonalities and the Interpersonal Character of Ideas. 1911. Available at Internet Archive.
• The Pleroma, an Essay on the Origin of Christianity. 1909. 163 pages. Available at Hathitrust, Internet Archive, and other sources.
• The Point of View, an Anthology of Religion and Philosophy Selected from the Works of Paul Carus. 1927. Catherine E. Cook, editor.
• Primer of philosophy. Chicago, 1893. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The Rise of Man; a Sketch of the Origin of the Human Race. 1907. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The Story of Samson and Its Place in the Religious Development of Mankind. 1907. Available at Hathitrust, Internet Archive, and other sources.]
• Truth on Trial; an Exposition of the Nature of Truth, Preceded by a Critique of Pragmatism and an Appreciation of Its Leader. 1911.Available at Hathitrust, Internet Archive, and other sources. Reprinted by several publishers.
Articles
• "The Crown of Thorns. A Story of the Time of Christ," The Open Court Vol. 1901: Issue 4, Article 1. Available at: OpenSIUC.
Additional resources
• Weir, Jr., Edgar A. "The Whiter Lotus: Asian religions and reform movements in America, 1836-1933." (2011). University of Nevada Theses/Dissertations/Professonal Papers/Capstones. University of Nevada. Paper 932.
Notes
1. Paul Carus, Philosophy as a science: a synopsis of writings of Dr. Paul Carus, containing an introduction written by himself, summaries of his books, and a list of articles to date. (Chicago, 1909), 2.
2. Note: emigration dates very on Carus applications for U. S. passport in 1892, 1900, and 1912. Dates given for 1882 and 1883 would not be possible for the ship consistently named as Grecian Monarch because it did not sail on the London-New York route until mmid-1883.
3. "Marianne Carus," Immigrant Entrepreneurship website. Accessed January 2, 2016.
4. Application for passport. 1907.
5. Rick Fields, How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of Buddhism in America (Boulder, Co: Shambhala Publications, 1992), 128.
6. Michael C. Howard. Transnationalism and Society: An Introduction. (Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Co., 2011). 199.
7. "Some Remarkable 'News'" The Theosophic Messenger 5.9 (June, 1904), 135.
8. "160 years of Paul Carus," Hegeler Carus Foundation website. Accessed January 2, 2016.
9. "160 years of Paul Carus," Hegeler Carus Foundation website. Accessed January 2, 2016.
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Paul Carus
by Illinois Biographical Dictionary
2008-2009 Edition
(1852-1919) – Philosopher, was born on July 18, 1852, in Ilsenburg, Germany, the son of Dr. Gustav Carus and Laura (Krueger) Carus, a family of distinguished scholars. His father, then pastor at Ilsenburg, later became first superintendent general of the Church of Eastern and Western Prussia. Carus received a good education in mathematics and the classics at the gymnasia of Posen and Stettin, and after studied at the universities of Greisswald, Strassburg, and Tubingen, where he received a Ph.D. in 1876. He then became a teacher in the military academy at Dresden, but his liberal views soon brought him into opposition to the authorities, and he eventually resigned. In the early 1880s, he went to England and later came to the United States.
Carus had by now worked through a devastating period of religious skepticism into what was to remain his life-long philosophy. This consisted in a thoroughgoing monism of mind and matter, based on community of form and on the identity of the laws of nature and the laws of mind. Philosophy, he believed, could be reduced to a science as objective as any of the other sciences. While thus opposed in principle to all subjectivism, he believed that the religious aspirations of mankind could be satisfied with a scientific conception of God as the impersonal world-order, and a historical conception of immortality as the survival of one’s influence. Carus devoted the rest of his life to working out this philosophy in detail. His bibliography embraced more than one thousand titles. In 1887, the Chicago zinc-manufacturer, Edward C. Hegeler, founded the Open Court as a journal devoted to the establishment of religion and ethics on a scientific basis. Carus contributed several articles, and was then appointed editor. The magazine, first as a weekly, then as a monthly, flourished under his capable management. He threw open its columns to contributors, regardless of their previous prestige, and, with equal zest, entered into controversy with nobodies and with philosophers of established reputation. The interest of an idea, rather than its author, attracted him. His ties with Hegeler were drawn closer by his marriage on March 29, 1888, to Hegeler’s daughter, Mary. In 1890, Hegeler established the Monist as a quarterly to take care of the more technical contributions to the Open Court, and Carus became editor of the new magazine also. Soon the reprinting of valuable articles led to the development of the Open Court Publishing Company which, under Carus’ direction, gradually enlarged its scope to include the republication at popular prices of philosophical classics, and the publication of new philosophical works and notable scientific treatises, such as those of Boole and Dedekind in mathematics, Binet and Ribot in psychology, and Mach in physics.
Carus exercised a wide popular influence on behalf of a more rational attitude toward religion and ethics than had been up to now, prevalent in the United States. His direct influence on American philosophy was curiously slight. Among his many books, probably the most important are Fundamental Problems (1889); The Soul of Man (1891); The Gospel of Buddha (1894), a compilation of Buddhist scriptures, which was widely translated and was adopted in Buddhist schools in Ceylon and Japan.
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Accessed: 3/26/19
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Paul Carus
Paul Carus (German: [ˈkaːʀʊs]; 18 July 1852 – 11 February 1919) was a German-American author, editor, a student of comparative religion[1] and philosopher.[2]
Life and education
Carus was born in Ilsenburg, Germany, and educated at the universities of Strassburg (then Germany, now France) and Tübingen, Germany. After obtaining his PhD from Tübingen in 1876[3] he served in the army and then taught school. He had been raised in a pious and orthodox Protestant home, but gradually moved away from this tradition.[4]
He left Bismarck's Imperial Germany for the United States, "because of his liberal views".[2][5] After he immigrated to the USA (in 1884) he lived in Chicago, and in LaSalle, Illinois. Paul Carus married Edward C. Hegeler's daughter Mary (Marie) and the couple later moved into the Hegeler Carus Mansion, built by her father. They had six children.[6]
Career
In the United States, Carus briefly edited a German-language journal and wrote several articles for the Index, the Free Religious Association organ.[1]
Soon after, he became the first managing editor of the Open Court Publishing Company, founded in 1887 by his father-in-law.[5] The goals of Open Court were to provide a forum for the discussion of philosophy, science, and religion, and to make philosophical classics widely available by making them affordable.[6]
He also acted as the editor for two periodicals published by the company, The Open Court and The Monist.[3]
He was introduced to Charles Sanders Peirce, the founder of American Pragmatism, by Judge Francis C. Russell of Chicago. Carus stayed abreast of Peirce's work and would eventually publish a number of his articles.[7]
During his lifetime, Carus published 75 books and 1500 articles,[8] mostly through Open Court Publishing Company. He wrote books and articles on history, politics, philosophy, religion, logic, mathematics, anthropology, science, and social issues of his day. In addition, Carus corresponded with many of the greatest minds of the late 19th and early 20th century, sending and receiving letters from Leo Tolstoy, Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla, Booker T. Washington, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Ernst Mach, Ernst Haeckel, John Dewey, and many more.
Carus's world view and philosophy
Carus considered himself a theologian rather than philosopher. He referred to himself as "an atheist who loved God".[9][10]
Carus is proposed to be a pioneer in the promotion of interfaith dialogue. He explored the relationship of science and religion, and was instrumental in introducing Eastern traditions and ideas to the West.[5] He was a key figure in the introduction of Buddhism to the West,[4] sponsoring Buddhist translation work of D.T. Suzuki, and fostering a lifelong working friendship with Buddhist Master, Soyen Shaku. Carus' interest in Asian religions seems to have intensified after he attended the World's Parliament of Religions (in 1893).
For years afterwards, Carus was a strong sympathizer of Buddhist ideas, but stopped short of committing fully to this, or any other, religion. Instead, he ceaselessly promoted his own rational concept which he called the "Religion of Science." Carus had a selective approach and he believed that religions evolve over time. After a battle for survival, he expected a "cosmic religion of universal truth" to emerge from the ashes of traditional beliefs.[4]
Carus proposed his own philosophy similar to panpsychism known as 'panbiotism', which he defined as "everything is fraught with life; it contains life; it has the ability to live."[11]
Religion of Science
Carus was a follower of Benedictus de Spinoza; he was of the opinion that Western thought had fallen into error early in its development in accepting the distinctions between body and mind and the material and the spiritual. (Kant's phenomenal and noumenal realms of knowledge; Christianity's views of the soul and the body, and the natural and the supernatural). Carus rejected such dualisms, and wanted science to reestablish the unity of knowledge.[12] The philosophical result he labeled Monism.[1]
His version of monism is more closely associated with a kind of pantheism, although it was occasionally identified with positivism.[10] He regarded every law of nature as a part of God's being. Carus held that God was the name for a cosmic order comprising "all that which is the bread of our spiritual life." He held the concept of a personal God as untenable. He acknowledged Jesus Christ as a redeemer, but not as the only one, for he believed that other religious founders were equally endowed with similar qualities.[10]
His beliefs attempted to steer a middle course between idealistic metaphysics and materialism. He differed with metaphysicians because they "reified" words and treated them as if they were realities, and he objected to materialism because it ignored or overlooked the importance of form. Carus emphasized form by conceiving of the divinity as a cosmic order. He objected to any monism which sought the unity of the world, not in the unity of truth, but in the oneness of a logical assumption of ideas. He referred to such concepts as henism, not monism.[10]
Carus held that truth was independent of time, human desire, and human action. Therefore, science was not a human invention, but a human revelation which needed to be apprehended; discovery meant apprehension; it was the result or manifestation of the cosmic order in which all truths were ultimately harmonious.[10]
Criticisms of Carus' ideas
It is claimed that Carus was dismissed by Orientalists and philosophers alike because of his failure to comply with the rules of either discipline.[13]
Legacy
The legacy of Paul Carus is honored through the efforts of the Hegeler Carus Foundation, the Carus Lectures at the American Philosophical Association (APA), and the Paul Carus Award for Interreligious Understanding[14] by the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions (CPWR).
Bibliography
His publications include:
• The Open Court Fortnightly Journal Vol 1 1887-1888
• The Soul Of Man: An Investigation Of The Facts Of Physiological And Experimental Psychology (1891, republished 2006) ISBN 1-4286-1359-5
• Monism: Its Scope and Import (1891)
• Homilies of Science (The Open Court Publishing Co., 1892)
• The Religion of Science (1893, republished 2007) ISBN 1-4304-4286-7
• Truth in fiction: twelve tales with a moral 1893
• The Philosophy of the Tool 1893
• The Gospel of Buddha (1894) ISBN 0-87548-228-7[15]
• Buddhism and Its Christian Critics (1894, republished 2005) ISBN 0-7661-9140-0
• The History of the Devil and the Idea of Evil (1900) ISBN 0-517-15064-6[16]
• Eros and Psyche: A fairy-tale of ancient Greece, retold after Apuleius (1900)
• Fundamental problems; the method of philosophy as a systematic arrangement of knowledge 1903
• The Surd of Metaphysics (1903)
• The Nature of the State 1904
• Kant and Spencer; a study of the fallacies of agnosticism 1904
• Karma: A Story of Buddhist Ethics (1905, republished 2004) ISBN 0-7661-9172-9
• Primer of philosophy 1906
• Story of Samson and its Place in the Religious Development of Mankind (1907, republished 2003) ISBN 0-7661-3877-1
• The Bride Of Christ: A Study In Christian Legend Lore (1908)
• The Foundations of Mathematics (1908,[17] republished 2004) ISBN 1-59605-006-3
• GOD: An Enquiry into the Nature of Man's Highest Ideal and a Solution of the Problem from the Standpoint of Science (1908, republished 2007) ISBN 1-60206-390-7
• The Philosopher's Martyrdom; A Satire 1908
• Godward; a record of religious progress 1908
• The Pleroma: An Essay on the Origin of Christianity (1909)
• Philosophy as a Science: A Synopsis of the Writings of Paul Carus (1909)
• The Philosophy of Form (1911, republished 2007) ISBN 1-4304-9402-6
• The Mechanistic Principle and the Non-Mechanical: An Inquiry into Fundamentals With Extracts from Representatives of Either Side (1913) ISBN 0-912050-69-1[18]
• The Principle of Relativity In the Light of the Philosophy of Science (1913, republished 2004) ISBN 0-7661-9185-0
• Nietzsche and Other Exponents of Individualism (1914,[19] republished 2007) ISBN 1-4325-2343-0
• Goethe, with special consideration of his philosophy, by Paul Carus 1915
• Kant's Prolegomena (1902, republished 1947)
• The Rise of Man: A Sketch of the Origin of the Human Race ISBN 1-4179-5157-5 (republished 2004)
• The Ethical Problem 1899 (republished 2005) ISBN 1-4212-7343-8
See also
• American philosophy
• List of American philosophers
• Necessitarianism
• Pleroma
References
1. Oriental Ideas in American Thought, from Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Studies of Selected Pivotal Ideas, edited by Philip P. Wiener (Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1973–74).
2. Austrian Philosophy, by Barry Smith, Note
3. The Monist:An International Quarterly Journal of General Philosophical Inquiry, featuring essays from scholars around the globe.
4. The American Encounter with Buddhism, 1844–1912: Victorian Culture and the Limits of Dissent, by Thomas A. Tweed (Paperback), page 65-67
5. "Open Court: About Us". http://www.opencourtbooks.com.
6. History of the Heleger Carus Foundation – The Hegeler Carus Mansion Archived 28 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
7. William James and Yogaacaara philosophy: A comparative inquiry, by Miranda Shaw, (University of Hawaii Press, 1987), page 241, note 4
8. History of the Heleger Carus Foundation – Open Court Publishing Company Archived 28 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
9. The Gospel of Buddha, by Paul Carus, page 26
10. Recent American Thought Archived 2 March 2008 at the Wayback Machine, from The Radical AcademyArchived 30 March 2008 at the Wayback Machine
11. Skrbina, David. (2005). Panpsychism in the West. MIT Press. p. 149. ISBN 0-262-19522-4
• Carus Paul (1893). "Panpsychism and Panbiotism". The Monist. 3 (2): 234–257. doi:10.5840/monist18933222. JSTOR 27897062.
12. Meyer, Donald Harvey (Winter 1962). "Paul Carus and the Religion of Science". American Quarterly. 14 (4): 597–607. doi:10.2307/2710135. JSTOR 2710135.
13. Future Religion – Making an American Buddha Archived 10 November 2013 at the Wayback Machine, by Judith Snodgrass. A review of republished The Gospel of Buddha
14. The Paul Carus Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Interreligious Movement Archived 16 June 2006 at the Wayback Machine. See also: Carus Award 2004 Archived27 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
15. "The Gospel of Buddha - Paul Carus (1894) - Index Document". http://www.mountainman.com.au.
16. "History of the Devil Index". http://www.sacred-texts.com.
17. Owens, Frederick William (1910). "Review: The Foundations of Mathematics by Paul Carus". Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 16: 541–542. doi:10.1090/S0002-9904-1910-01969-8.
18. "Review: The Mechanistic Principle and the Non-Mechanical by Paul Carus". The Harvard Theological Review. 7 (2): 271–272. April 1914. doi:10.1017/s0017816000011196.
19. Salter, William Mackintire (July 1915). "Review of 4 books:Nietzsche and Other Exponents of Individualism by Paul Carus;The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche by H. L. Mencken; The Philosophy of Nietzsche: An Exposition and an Appreciation by Georges Chatterton-Hill; Nietzsche, sein Leben und seine Werkeby Richard M. Meyer". The Harvard Theological Review. 8 (3): 400–408. doi:10.1017/s0017816000008993.
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Paul Carus
by Theosophy Wiki
Accessed: 3/20/21
Paul Carus
Dr. Paul Carus was a German-American writer and editor based in Chicago and La Salle, Illinois. As editor of the Open Court Publishing Company, he published hundreds of books and articles that were very influential in the fields of comparative religion, philosophy, science, and mathematics. His work with D. T. Suzuki in translating Chinese and Japanese texts was particularly noteworthy.
Dr. Carus wrote of the principle that guided his work:
The aim of all my writings centers in the endeavor to build up a sound and tenable philosophy, one that would be as objective as any branch of the natural sciences. I do not want to propound a new philosophy of my own but to help in working out philosophy itself, viz., philosophy as a science; and after many years of labor in this field I have come to the conclusion, not only that it is possible, but also that such a conception of the world is actually preparing itself in the minds of men. [1]
Early life and education
Paul Carus was born at Ilsenburg in Germany on July 18, 1852. His parents were Gustave Carus and Laura Krueger Carus.
Carus, Paul (18 July 1852–11 February 1919), editor, author, and philosopher, was born in Ilsenburg, Germany, the son of Dr. Gustav Carus, the first superintendent-general of the Church of Eastern and Western Prussia, and Laura Krueger. As the son of a well-known theologian and state church official, Carus was afforded an appropriate Gymnasium education, which focused on mathematics and the classics. He studied at the Universities of Greifswald, Strasbourg, and Tübingen, eventually earning his Ph.D. degree from Tübingen in 1876. His first professional position was as an educator at the military academy in Dresden, an appointment he soon resigned because of conflicts over his liberal religious views. He then lived briefly in England (1881–1884) before traveling to the United States and settling in LaSalle, Illinois, where he lived for the remainder of his life....
-- Paul Carus, by American National Biography
Obituary
On the eighteenth of August last, suddenly died, of heart-disease, Dr. Gustav Carus, the Superintendent General of the State Church of Eastern Prussia, and the father of Dr. Paul Carus, the editor of THE OPEN COURT. Our readers, who have felt, in Dr. Gustav Carus's criticism of the work of THE OPEN COURT (No. 70) the lofty purpose, the sincere tone, and high moral conviction of his life, will share in common our deep regret. We extract the following biographical notes from the Ostpreussische Zeitung, of August 21, just received.
***
Wilhelm Friedrich Gustav Carus was born February '24th, 1819, at Dahme, in the province of Brandenburg, Prussia. He evinced, in early life, marked aptitudes for a career in the church, and, after the completion of his preliminary education at the Gymnasium, began the study of theology at the Universities of Berlin and Halle, where the influence of Julius Muller and Tholuck especially affected his development. On entering upon the active duties of his profession, his career was one of steady preferment, culminating in the promotion to the general superintendency, for Eastern Prussia, of the Prussian State Church.
The theological faculty of the University of Greifswald bestowed upon him in 1868, in recognition of his scientific and theological writings, the high degree of Doctor of Theology.
A power peculiarly his own, was to inspire, to stimulate. Wherever a new undertaking was formed, wherever obstacles were to be removed, there he was to be found; withholding no effort, avoiding no journey, and sparing no labor. It was a pleasure for him to go onward; and hindrance only aroused redoubled energy. He accomplished much, and our province is indebted to him for much. We will mention here but the following memorials that he has placed in our midst: the excellent "New Evangelical Hymn-Book," which supplied a true need in this field, the reformed system of theological examinations, * * * etc., etc. We cannot pretend to estimate the wide-reaching effects of the personal inspiration that he brought to bear upon others. The whole province knew their chief-pastor and loved him. He never withdrew himself from their midst, but wheresoever the welfare of those committed to his charge demanded it, he was present, disregardful of personal comfort and health. His cooperation, when sought, was never refused. To devote his whole energy, body and soul, to the service of his office, was the rule of his life, and this he demanded from his clergy.
Of a cheerful disposition, teeming with humor and wit, he enjoyed the company of the light-hearted, and many a merry word fell from his lips. Yet in his inmost depths he was a serious, earnest man, the roots of whose being were firmly fixed, in penitence as in faith, in the Christian Creed; his look ever unswervingly directed towards Zion.
-- Obituary, by The Open Court, A Weekly Journal Devoted to the Work of Conciliating Religion with Science, September 12, 1889
He studied at the University of Greifswald, completed a degree at the University of Strasbourg in 1876, and then a Ph. D. at the University of Tubingen. Paul emigrated to the United States around 1884 on the SS Grecian Monarch.[2] In 1887 he was invited by Edward C. Hegeler, to help educate his children in the classics at the family home in La Salle, Illinois.[3] Hegeler had come to the United States in 1857 and established a huge zinc mining business in central Illinois, along with other businesses and the Open Court Publishing Company in Chicago. Dr. Carus began contributing articles to a journal that Hegeler founded in 1887, and in 1888 was married to Hegeler's daughter Mary. On May 23, 1889, Carus became a naturalized American citizen at a court in New York.[4]
Paul Carus
Open Court Publishing Company
The Open Court Publishing Company was founded in 1887 by Edward C. Hegeler, who remained as president when he brought Paul Carus on board as editor. The editorial office was located at 324 Dearborn Street in Chicago. The Open Court was published from 1887 to 1936, and a philosophical journal, The Monist, is a quarterly that was founded in 1888 and continues publication today under the auspices of Oxford University Press. The publishing company was also responsible for printing over 500 books on philosophy, science, mathematics, Eastern religions, Christianity, and other subjects.
1893 World's Parliament of Religions
Dr. Carus attended the World's Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893 and made a 30-minute talk on "Science as Religious Revelation." At that time he had the opportunity to meet many visiting representatives of Eastern religions, including some Theosophists:
He invited Dharmapala to give a lecture tour in the United States in 1896 and again in 1902-04. Carus also befriended the Japanese Zen master Soyen Shaku (1859-1919), whom he met at the Parliament.[5] After attending the Parliament Soyen traveled to Sri Lanka to study Pali and Theravada Buddhism for three years. At Carus's request Shaku also sent one of his students, Daisetsu Teitaro Suzuki, to the United States to translate Buddhist works for Carus's Open court Publishing Company.[6]
Paul Carus
The Paul Carus Award for interreligious understanding was instituted in 2001 by the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions following a donation by the family Dr. Carus. Since then it has been awarded at the Parliments in Barcelona (2004), Melbourne (2009), and Salt Lake City (2015).
Theosophical Society connections
Dr. Carus was certainly acquainted with Theosophists and with others who were indirectly connected to the Theosophical Movement, but he was never a member of any Theosophical Society. Theosophy was never a major interest to him. An article in the April 1904 issue of his journal The Monist (entitled "Mme Blavatsky" and authored by Henry Ridgeley Evans), was riddled with inaccuracies.[7] However, his publications were widely read, reviewed, and recommended by Theosophists.
Work with D. T. Suzuki
D. T. Suzuki (October 1870 – July 12, 1966) lived with the Carus family for eleven years in La Salle, Illinois, which became known as “Buddhism’s Gateway to the West.” Carus and Suzuki worked together on translations of texts from Chinese and Japanese languages. One notable work published in 1900 was Açvaghosha's discourse on the awakening of faith in the Mahâyâna, the Chinese version of the Sanskrit manuscript Mahayanasraddhotpadasastra by Asvaghosa. Other examples of titles published in Chicago by Open Court Publishing were:
• Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro; Carus, Paul. Yin chih wen; the tract of the quiet Way, with extracts from the Chinese commentary. 1906. 48 pages. Translated from the Chinese. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro; Carus, Paul. T`ai-shang kan-ying p`ien. 1906. Treatise of the Exalted One on response and retribution. Translated from the Chinese, with sixteen plates by Chinese artists, and a frontispiece by Keichyu Yamada. Available at Hathitrust.
• Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro; Shaku, Soen. Sermons of a Buddhist abbot; addresses on religious subjects. 1906. Sermons of Soen Shaku translated from the Japanese by Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki.
Personal life
Paul and Mary Carus
Dr. Carus and his wife Mary had six children named Edward, Gustave, Paula, Elizabeth, Herman, and Alwin. They lived in La Salle, Illinois, at 1307 Seventh Street, with his father-in-law Edward C. Hegeler. The house, now known as the Hegeler Carus Mansion, was built for Edward C. Hegeler in 1876. The Carus family also lived for a time at the Julius W. Hegeler I Home, another historic mansion in La Salle. That house was designed by Chicago architects Pond and Pond, who also designed the L. W. Rogers Building, headquarters of the Theosophical Society in America. Because Paul Carus brought Buddhist visitors to stay at his home, La Salle became known as “Buddhism’s Gateway to the West.”
Dr. Carus died at home on February 11, 1919. According to the Hegeler Carus Foundation website, "The legacy of Paul Carus is honored through the efforts of the Hegeler Carus Foundation, the Paul Carus Award for Interreligious Understanding by the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions (CPWR) and through Open Court Publishing, which is still operated by the Carus Family and specializes in scholarly and trade non-fiction, with an emphasis on philosophy, social issues, Eastern thought, education, psychology, Jungian analysis, and religion and science."[8]
Carus Lectures are given by distinguished philosophers at meetings of the American Philosophical Association.
Correspondence
Much of the correspondence between Carus and other influential people still exists:
Carus corresponded with many of the greatest minds of the late 19th and early 20th century. Carus made a copy of the letters he sent, and kept them with those he received as a record of complete correspondence. These letters from great thinkers of his time, such as Leo Tolstoy, Thomas Edison, Nichola Tesla, Booker T. Washington, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Ernst Mach, Ernst Haeckel, John Dewey, and many more are now archived in the Special Collections at the Morris Library of Southern Illinois University, Carbondale.[9]
Writings
Dr. Carus wrote hundreds of articles for The Open Court and The Monist, but none for Theosophical journals. Theosophists were keenly aware of his work however, and the Union Index of Theosophical Periodicals lists 24 articles that were reprints or reviews of Carus works.
Open Court Publishing Company in Chicago was responsible for issuing about 75 books by Dr. Carus, and has continued reprinting some of them since. A summary of his writings until 1909 is found in Philosophy as a Science: a Synopsis of Writings of Dr. Paul Carus, Containing an Introduction Written by Himself, Summaries of His Books, and a List of Articles to Date. The extent of his writing is evident to the reader who sees 64 pages of book synopses and 95 pages briefly summarizing each article. Carus writings are also listed at Online Books webpage.
The following sections exemplify the range of his books.
The Gospel of Buddhism
The Gospel of Buddha: According to Old Records was the most influential work of Carus. In addition to numerous English editions beginning with the 1894 edition from Open Court Publishing Co., the book was translated into Japanese, German, Chinese, French, Hebrew, Spanish, Polish, Telugu, and Hindi. These are some of the editions:
• The Gospel of Buddha: According to Old Records. 1894. 308 pages. Available at Internet Archive.
• The Gospel of Buddha. Open Court Publishing Co. 1895. 3rd revised edition. 275 pages.
• The Gospel of Buddha. Open Court Publishing Co. 1915. 310 pages. "Compiled from ancient records by Paul Carus; illustrated by O. Kopetzky." Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The Gospel of Buddha: According to Old records. Open Court Publishing Co. 2004. Revised and enlarged edition. 522 pages." Paul Carus; introd. by Martin J. Verhoeven; foreword by Donald S. Lopez; pref. by Blouke Carus; illustrations by Keichu Yamada and Olga Kopetzky."
• Hanna, Boyd. The Sayings of Buddha. 1957. Derived from the Carus work.
Fiction and poetry
• Karma, a story of Buddhist ethics. 1903. Fiction. Illustrated by Kwason Suzuki.
• K'ung Fu Tze; a Dramatic Poem. 1915. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• Nirvâna, a Story of Buddhist Psychology. 1902. Fiction. Illustrations by Kwasong Suzuki. Available at Google Books.
Non-fiction
• Amitabha: a Story of Buddhist Theology. 1906. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive. Translated into German and Thai.
• The Bride of Christ; a Study in Christian Legend Lore. 1908. Available at Hathitrust and other sources.
• Chinese Thought; an Exposition of the Main Characteristic Features of the Chinese World-conception'. 1907. 195 pages. Abridged version published as "Chinese Astrology in La Salle, 1974.
• The Canon of Reason and Virtue (Lao-tze's Tao Teh King) / Translated from the Chinese. 1903. Available at Hathitrust.
• The Dharma, or, The Religion of Enlightenment: an Exposition of Buddhism. 1896. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• Eros and Psyche: a Fairy-tale of Ancient Greece, Retold after Apuleius. 1900. Illustrations by Paul Thumann. Available at Internet Archive and Hathitrust.
• God; an Enquiry into the Nature of Man's Highest Ideal and a Solution of the Problem from the Standpoint of Science. 1908. Available at Hathitrust, Freading, and other sources.
• Goethe, with Special Consideration of His Philosophy. 1915. 357 pages. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The History of the Devil and the Idea of Evil, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day. 1900. Available at Hathitrust and other sources.
• Kant and Spencer; a Study of the Fallacies of Agnosticism. 1899. Available at Hathitrust and Google Books.
• Lao-tze's Tao-Teh-King / Chinese-English. With introduction, transliteration, and notes. 1898. Available at Internet Archive.
• Philosophy as a Science: a Synopsis of Writings of Dr. Paul Carus, Containing an Introduction Written by Himself, Summaries of His Books, and a List of Articles to Date. 1909. 213 pages. Available at Internet Archive, Hathitrust, and other sources. Reprinted 1911, 1968.
• Personality, with Special Reference to Superpersonalities and the Interpersonal Character of Ideas. 1911. Available at Internet Archive.
• The Pleroma, an Essay on the Origin of Christianity. 1909. 163 pages. Available at Hathitrust, Internet Archive, and other sources.
• The Point of View, an Anthology of Religion and Philosophy Selected from the Works of Paul Carus. 1927. Catherine E. Cook, editor.
• Primer of philosophy. Chicago, 1893. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The Rise of Man; a Sketch of the Origin of the Human Race. 1907. Available at Hathitrust and Internet Archive.
• The Story of Samson and Its Place in the Religious Development of Mankind. 1907. Available at Hathitrust, Internet Archive, and other sources.]
• Truth on Trial; an Exposition of the Nature of Truth, Preceded by a Critique of Pragmatism and an Appreciation of Its Leader. 1911.Available at Hathitrust, Internet Archive, and other sources. Reprinted by several publishers.
Articles
• "The Crown of Thorns. A Story of the Time of Christ," The Open Court Vol. 1901: Issue 4, Article 1. Available at: OpenSIUC.
Additional resources
• Weir, Jr., Edgar A. "The Whiter Lotus: Asian religions and reform movements in America, 1836-1933." (2011). University of Nevada Theses/Dissertations/Professonal Papers/Capstones. University of Nevada. Paper 932.
Notes
1. Paul Carus, Philosophy as a science: a synopsis of writings of Dr. Paul Carus, containing an introduction written by himself, summaries of his books, and a list of articles to date. (Chicago, 1909), 2.
2. Note: emigration dates very on Carus applications for U. S. passport in 1892, 1900, and 1912. Dates given for 1882 and 1883 would not be possible for the ship consistently named as Grecian Monarch because it did not sail on the London-New York route until mmid-1883.
3. "Marianne Carus," Immigrant Entrepreneurship website. Accessed January 2, 2016.
4. Application for passport. 1907.
5. Rick Fields, How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of Buddhism in America (Boulder, Co: Shambhala Publications, 1992), 128.
6. Michael C. Howard. Transnationalism and Society: An Introduction. (Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Co., 2011). 199.
7. "Some Remarkable 'News'" The Theosophic Messenger 5.9 (June, 1904), 135.
8. "160 years of Paul Carus," Hegeler Carus Foundation website. Accessed January 2, 2016.
9. "160 years of Paul Carus," Hegeler Carus Foundation website. Accessed January 2, 2016.
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Paul Carus
by Illinois Biographical Dictionary
2008-2009 Edition
(1852-1919) – Philosopher, was born on July 18, 1852, in Ilsenburg, Germany, the son of Dr. Gustav Carus and Laura (Krueger) Carus, a family of distinguished scholars. His father, then pastor at Ilsenburg, later became first superintendent general of the Church of Eastern and Western Prussia. Carus received a good education in mathematics and the classics at the gymnasia of Posen and Stettin, and after studied at the universities of Greisswald, Strassburg, and Tubingen, where he received a Ph.D. in 1876. He then became a teacher in the military academy at Dresden, but his liberal views soon brought him into opposition to the authorities, and he eventually resigned. In the early 1880s, he went to England and later came to the United States.
Carus's struggle was representative in many ways. He was reared in an intensely religious household in Germany. His father, a prominent Protestant clergyman, even became superintendent of the Church of Eastern and Western Prussia. The son planned to become a Christian missionary. That plan, of course, had to be abandoned when Carus discovered that he no longer believed the message he was expected to proclaim. This is some evidence that Carus actually had become "heterodox" when he was quite young; it was at the age of twelve, he told Edmunds one evening in Philadelphia in 1906. In any case, as Soyen noted, Carus "deviated considerably from the traditional Christianity represented by his father." This loss of faith put distance between him and his father. It cost him his teaching position at the military academy at the Royal Saxon Cadet Corps, and it propelled him to seek a more hospitable religious climate first in England and finally, in 1884, in the United States.
-- The American Encounter with Buddhism, 1844-1912: Victorian Culture & the Limits of Dissent, by Thomas A. Tweed
Carus had by now worked through a devastating period of religious skepticism into what was to remain his life-long philosophy. This consisted in a thoroughgoing monism of mind and matter, based on community of form and on the identity of the laws of nature and the laws of mind. Philosophy, he believed, could be reduced to a science as objective as any of the other sciences. While thus opposed in principle to all subjectivism, he believed that the religious aspirations of mankind could be satisfied with a scientific conception of God as the impersonal world-order, and a historical conception of immortality as the survival of one’s influence. Carus devoted the rest of his life to working out this philosophy in detail. His bibliography embraced more than one thousand titles. In 1887, the Chicago zinc-manufacturer, Edward C. Hegeler, founded the Open Court as a journal devoted to the establishment of religion and ethics on a scientific basis. Carus contributed several articles, and was then appointed editor. The magazine, first as a weekly, then as a monthly, flourished under his capable management. He threw open its columns to contributors, regardless of their previous prestige, and, with equal zest, entered into controversy with nobodies and with philosophers of established reputation. The interest of an idea, rather than its author, attracted him. His ties with Hegeler were drawn closer by his marriage on March 29, 1888, to Hegeler’s daughter, Mary. In 1890, Hegeler established the Monist as a quarterly to take care of the more technical contributions to the Open Court, and Carus became editor of the new magazine also. Soon the reprinting of valuable articles led to the development of the Open Court Publishing Company which, under Carus’ direction, gradually enlarged its scope to include the republication at popular prices of philosophical classics, and the publication of new philosophical works and notable scientific treatises, such as those of Boole and Dedekind in mathematics, Binet and Ribot in psychology, and Mach in physics.
Carus exercised a wide popular influence on behalf of a more rational attitude toward religion and ethics than had been up to now, prevalent in the United States. His direct influence on American philosophy was curiously slight. Among his many books, probably the most important are Fundamental Problems (1889); The Soul of Man (1891); The Gospel of Buddha (1894), a compilation of Buddhist scriptures, which was widely translated and was adopted in Buddhist schools in Ceylon and Japan.